


The Absence

by geekprincess26



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, Drama, F/M, King Arthur AU, Romance, Salty Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-27
Updated: 2018-05-27
Packaged: 2019-05-14 15:30:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14772293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geekprincess26/pseuds/geekprincess26
Summary: Jon Targaryen has returned to his native Britannia and freed his ancestral sword, Dark Sister, from the stone in which his father's death had trapped it.  He and Ned Stark, King of Northumbria, must band together to defeat the Saxons and save Britannia, but first Britannia must be united through Jon's marriage to Ned's daughter Sansa.  Marriage, however, proves to be much more than just beds and kisses, and Jon and Sansa struggle to adjust to their new life.  When disaster strikes and a witch's enchantment takes Sansa from Jon, they must each question their previous beliefs about each other and about how far each will go in the name of love.





	The Absence

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AliceInNeverNeverLand](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AliceInNeverNeverLand/gifts).



“Ned.”

 

The woman’s face was pale as the moon.  Her red hair spilled about her head on the pallet like waves of blood, like the blood that flowed from her fading heart.

 

Her husband knelt in front of her, his hand entwined with hers.  He shook his head, and a faint groan passed through his lips.

 

The woman raised her head a hand’s breadth off the bed, her neck muscles straining with the effort.  Her husband hastened to support her head, but she shook it and held her trembling right hand out toward the little girl standing behind him.  She was no more than eight and her mother in miniature, from the red hair to the pale skin and quaking hands.

 

“Take it off, Ned,” said the woman, her voice low but hard as the iron of the chain mail her husband wore more and more often these days to beat back the Saxons who had first swept onto Britannia’s shores from the east and south and now were encroaching onto the borders of the Stark family’s kingdom of Northumbria.

 

“Cat…”  Ned Stark swallowed thickly.  “Cat, she should not have to – ”

 

His wife, still straining to hold her head off the bed, shook it weakly.  “Father to son and mother to daughter, Ned.   When your time comes, you must do the same for Robb.”  She turned her head a hair’s breadth toward the doorway that led into the chambers of her young son, who had just this morn begun to recover from the same illness that was draining the life out of her.

 

Ned let out another groan.  It sounded like one of the cattle birthing.  At his side, little Sansa trembled harder and struggled to keep her hands clasped in front of her.

 

“Ned,” Catelyn Stark pleaded again, desperation seeping into her voice.  “You must.  Please, Ned.  The light must remain.  Please.”

 

Her husband’s face contorted into a spasm he covered with his hand.  When he had recovered himself, he reached down and pulled off the gold ring encircling his fourth finger.  The sapphire in the middle glowed, lit from within by a pale fire emanating from the heart of the stone.  Ned’s face twisted again as the jewel left his hand.  The light faded, and as soon as the ring had ceased to touch his finger it flickered out, leaving the stone nearly black.  Catelyn nodded once again toward little Sansa, and Ned drew the leather thong out of his hair, strung it through the ring, handed both back to his wife, and put his arm around his daughter’s shoulders.

 

“Come, love,” murmured Catelyn, and Ned urged his daughter forward until she was within Catelyn’s reach.  Catelyn held out her hand to the little girl, ring and string both resting on it.

 

“For you, sweetling,” she said, her voice but a whisper now.  “Keep it safe for your husband, yes?”

 

The little girl’s lips trembled, but she nodded and took the ring from her mother’s hand.

 

“Good girl,” whispered Catelyn.  “Shall you give your word, then?”

 

Sansa nodded again.  “I – I give my word as a Stark,” she said, and burst into tears.  Catelyn put a gentle hand to the back of the girl’s head and drew her down to lay her head on the pillow.  Ned reached a hand out to each of their heads and kissed them both in turn. 

  
Catelyn sighed, rested her hand against her husband’s cheek, and took a labored breath.

 

“Promise me he will be worthy,” she whispered.  “Promise me, Ned.”

 

One tear left the corner of Ned Stark’s eye, trickling down his cheek and into his wife’s hair.

 

“I promise, my love,” he choked out, burying his face into her shoulder.  “I promise.”

 

-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-

 

“Don’t bother promising me you’ll be back before the sun sets _again_ , Jon Targaryen,” Sansa Targaryen snapped at her husband as she yanked taut the ribbon she had just wound through her hair.

 

She had tried to be a good and patient wife during the eight moons’ turn of their marriage, but Jon had done the same thing three mornings in a row, and she was irritated beyond the measure of man at the moment.  She wondered for a moment if he was deliberately baiting her, but dismissed the thought at once, for cruelty was not Jon’s way.  No, usually when he angered her it was without even trying.  Judging by the confounded look on his face, he did not see why it should trouble her that he was taking his men out hunting for boar and stags until dusk for the third day in a row, leaving the petitions and the inventories and the smallfolk’s petitions for her to handle alone.

 

Sansa let out a sigh through her clenched teeth.  Jon’s lower lip was curling out just so again, and that always made it impossible for her to remain utterly angry at him, for she would remember that he was not a cruel or boorish husband, merely a frustrating one.   He had, in fact, been downright kind if a bit uncomfortable when her father had brought her to London for their wedding, not at all what Sansa had been expecting of a man said to have been descended from dragons.  Even her father had seemed pleased with him, and that was saying a good deal, for Ned Stark liked no one easily, and Jon Targaryen had been far from his first choice of a husband for his only daughter.  Quite apart from the rumors about his ancestors having mated with demons, Jon was the son of Rhaegar Targaryen, who had been King of Cornwall and Northumbria’s mortal enemy.  He was said to have slain at least fifty men in every battle he fought and refused to leave the field until he had dipped his famous sword, Dark Sister, in the blood of at least a hundred more. 

 

But then the Saxons had come roaring onto England’s southern shores, and King Rhaegar had received word of their coming too late to summon all of his men.  The Saxons had routed him in battle and slaughtered all of his men but two.  They had tried to take Dark Sister from his body so that his infant son could wield it one day, but according to the account they later gave, Rhaegar with his dying breath had flung the weapon into the air, whispering an incantation after it, and with a mighty jolt, the earth had split open and a stone in the perfect shape of a square had risen out of it and swallowed all but the hilt of the sword.  Terrified, the men had fled just in time to spirit Jon and his young mother, Lyanna Snow, to safety in Brittany. 

 

Over the next twenty years, the Saxons had battered kingdom after kingdom until Northumbria alone had stood against them.  Desperate, Ned Stark, Northumbria’s king, had rallied all Britons he could find, in Northumbria or otherwise, who would fight for his cause.  He had divided his forces and sent his son and heir, Robb Stark, to the east with the larger portion of his men, taking the rest south with him to divert the Saxon army.  But the diversion had failed, and the Saxons had slain Robb and most of his men in battle.  Ned Stark had gotten word of the enemy’s movements too late to save his son – indeed, only just in time to turn west to avoid the surviving Saxons, who were bent on wiping Ned and his men off the face of the earth.

 

But Ned Stark had beaten them to Britannia’s southern shores, and that on the very same day when Jon Targaryen had returned to the shores of Britannia with five thousand men and drawn Dark Sister out of the stone that encased it.  When they saw him do what thousands of Saxons and Britons alike had been unable to accomplish, his men had proclaimed him the king of all Britannia and urged Ned Stark to bend the knee.  Even many of Ned Stark’s men had thought it a wise plan, for the Saxons had found victory in uniting under Cerdic, their own high king.  But others of Ned’s men, mostly the richest and those who still held territories of their own, were loath to accede to that plan, so they and Jon had struck a bargain.  Sansa, Ned’s sole remaining child, would wed Jon, and their eldest son would rule over Britannia after both men had died.

 

When he had returned to Winterfell to gather both his forces and his daughter, Sansa had cried for the first time since her mother’s death.  Her family’s priest had always said that God could bring good out of any hardship, but Sansa had seen nothing but her, Robb, and her father’s heartache and loneliness proceed from her mother’s death.  Must God take Robb too, and now her, the only child left to their father?  Unless her being forced to give her life and future to the son of that demonic dragon king could be called good, which Sansa very much doubted, she saw naught but death and darkness.

 

So did the land around her.  Autumn’s cold winds pummeled the hills and coasts as Sansa, her father, and their men plodded south and west toward Cornwall, where Jon Targaryen had established a base at his birthplace of Tintagel Castle.  Scarcely a day passed when a gust of wind did not force tears out of the corners of Sansa’s eyes and into her hood, and more than half the time the tears came from more than the wind, despite Ned’s kind assurances.

 

“I have taken the measure of many a man in my day, sweetling, and he is an honest one,” he murmured one night as they huddled around a roaring fire over which the soldiers were roasting three deer and a wild boar for supper.  “I also inquired of his men, and to a man they praise his kindness and his concern for the welfare of all under his care.  And he has no bastard children, whether here or in Brittany.  I believe he will care well for you, daughter.”

 

Sansa swallowed a scoff and narrowed her eyes at the fire.  Among soldiers, a kind man could simply mean one who would execute his enemies with a clean beheading instead of gutting them like fish.  That same man could inflict all manner of bruises on his wife and still be termed kind and generous, as Sansa had seen with one too many of her father’s men.  Ned Stark himself had loved his wife dearly and treated her as a precious jewel all the days of her life.  He had deserved to wear Catelyn Stark’s marriage ring; but Sansa was not idiot enough to think most men were the same way, and she cringed to think of the jewel her mother had gifted her on her dying day gracing the finger of a man who had the blood of Rhaegar Targaryen, who had been as famous for his brutality as for the rumors that he had gained Lyanna Snow’s hand in marriage by kidnapping her and raping her son into her belly, running through his veins.  

 

But when she had met Jon Targaryen, he had bowed and addressed her as “Princess” and taken her hand with a warm, gentle grip, and he had not attempted to take his husband’s rights with her before they were wed.  When he had shown her her chambers in the drafty old castle, he had said she should but ask him if she wished for more rushes spread on the floor, or more blankets for her and her ladies’ beds, or more wood for the fire, and actually looked concerned, as if he meant it.  He asked her every day if her rooms contained everything she needed, and the night before their wedding, he had apologized that he had not a ship to spare to send for lemons from Hispania to make a lemon cake for her, but said they would have one upon the year’s anniversary of their wedding.  Sansa, who loved no food better than lemon cake, had let her jaw drop at those words.  When she found her tongue, she had thanked him and protested that of course that was not necessary, but he was very kind.  His dark eyes twinkled again, and she wondered if he thought to make fun of her; but the moment passed, and later she reflected that a jape at her expense would have been far preferable to cruelty in any case.

 

But Jon showed no cruelty, or indeed anything like it.  Indeed, when Jon’s and Ned’s men had carried them into Sansa’s chambers after the wedding feast, Jon had struck a man whose hand had wandered too close to her chest, and as soon as he too had been deposited on their marriage bed, he had shouted at everyone to leave the room at once.  He had murmured his apologies to Sansa for her treatment, his face reddening as he said it.  Then he had asked if she would like to leave on her shift for the rest of the evening.  Sansa, a maiden who knew little about bedding except what she could glean from her ladies’ gossip, had never thought to have such a choice; but her new husband had honored her wish to retain her shift, and before he had raised its skirt to take her maidenhead, he had kissed her gently on the forehead and cheeks and hands – particularly her left hand, now adorned with the silver filigree ring he had given her as a wedding gift – and then on her trembling mouth, and his lips felt warm and firm and surprisingly lovely against her own.  His hands were even gentler as they lowered to trace the outline of her waist and hips, and he even haltingly asked her permission to pull up her shift and ready her with his fingers.  Their touch discomforted Sansa at first, but did not hurt her; and then he kissed her again, and though there was pain when he took her, his lips eased it very much.  After they were finished, he had whispered his apologies for her pain, but Sansa only shook her head, wondering that he should even mention such a thing.  Perhaps, she thought, God had taken mercy on Jon and given him the blood and nature of his kind, dead mother, and not the demon blood that ran through the veins of Rhaegar and his ancestors before him.

 

But Sansa had awoken the following morning to find that Jon had already left their chambers to don his armor and train with his men; and she did not see him again until supper.  Their days followed much the same pattern over the next two moons’ turn: Jon would rise before her and spend much of the day preparing his men for their planned strike at Londinium in the heart of the Saxons’ territory.  As the days stretched into weeks, the castle and the land around it became home to all manner of Britons who, hearing of Jon’s arrival in Britannia, streamed into Cornwall for shelter from the Saxons’ brutality, pledging their loyalty and aid in the coming battles.  Ned Stark had been nearly as occupied with his own people, training many of his own men alongside Jon’s and directing some hundred more to return to Winterfell in Northumbria and fortify it against any Saxons who might escape Jon’s attack; and so the feeding and housing of the refugees had largely fallen to Sansa and to Jon’s older advisers, Lords Jeor Mormont and Davos Seaworth.  Both men had treated their new queen with the utmost respect, and their advice had been a great boon when quarrels over land and possessions had broken out and had to be mediated.

 

By the time the sun set every day, Jon and his men were invariably exhausted and in sore need of bathing, food, and rest.  In fact, the night after the wedding, he looked almost half asleep when he came to Sansa’s chambers.

 

“A cup of wine to ease your fatigue, my lord?” she had asked, and scolded herself silently for forgetting that Jon had said the previous day that since they were now husband and wife, it was only fitting that she call him by his given name.  He shook his head, and Sansa removed her linen robe and sat down on the bed.  She winced as she did so, her body still sore from the previous night when Jon had taken her maidenhead.  Jon noticed her flinch, and his eyes widened, and he apologized again and said he would not touch her; and despite Sansa’s protests, he left for his own chambers and did not take her again until after her moon blood had come a week later.

 

Gradually, Sansa’s body accustomed itself to her husband’s evening ministrations, and quickly the pain lessened and vanished, and if she enjoyed it less than he did, judging from the heat of his kisses on her brow and lips and his ecstatic murmurs of her name against her throat and shoulders, still it was neither brutal nor unwelcome; and every now and then Jon’s hands, always wandering and gently stroking her body’s curves, brushed a spot or two that gave her tingles of pleasure.  Usually, he noticed it and touched her over and over until she hummed with delight; and the night before he departed for Londinium with her father, she found herself returning his kisses with a fervor that matched the gentle undulations of his body upon her own.

 

But as intimately as Jon touched her at night, he was equally short and blunt during the day – not just with his men, but with his wife.  He always asked after her comfort and the state of her rooms and whether she wanted anything, and once or twice, to her great surprise, he had collared a man whom he deemed had been leering at his wife and had thrown him out of the castle to spend the night in a tent in the snow; but other than that he said little to Sansa.  She tried at first to ask him about his training and whether he would like the boar or the venison to be served for dinner; but he gave short answers, and after some time Sansa gave up, supposing that all his energies were taken with the upcoming campaign against the Saxons.

 

But Jon’s daytime brusqueness always faded on the nights he came to her chambers, and on the morning he left for Londinium, it melted altogether, when to Sansa’s surprise he held her tenderly in bed and kissed her and whispered, “God be with you, my Sansa.” 

 

Her lips were swollen with his kisses by the time she stood in front of the castle watching him gallop away with his men; and she found herself absently touching them throughout the day and wondering if he had left her with child.

 

He had not, as it turned out; and they would not get the chance to try again to make one for nearly four moons’ turn, until Jon and Ned had met the Saxons in battle and fought for a night and a day, until the blood of the slain men had soaked an acre and more of ground, and Ned had saved Jon from Cerdic’s death blow, suffering a near-fatal wound for his efforts so that his new son-in-law could recover in time to run the man through.

 

As soon as the battle was over and the remaining Saxons captured or killed, Jon had sent for his wife, who exchanged cold, damp Tintagel Castle for an equally cold albeit less damp and grander castle in Londinium.  She arrived to find that Jon had had her chambers cleaned and lit and well-prepared, and had thanked him sincerely; but he had only nodded in that brusque way of his and said he was glad to hear it, and gone on to greet Lords Davos and Jeor.

 

Ever since then, Jon had labored day and night alongside his men to rebuild Londinium.  Much as he had done at Tintagel Castle before, he left the two older lords and Sansa to order the housing of the refugees and the running of the castle.  He often worked long into the night, forcing Sansa to have to explain his absences to the folk crowded into the castle’s halls every night for supper and every morning to bring their petitions to their new king and queen. 

 

“He works to repair Londinium and make it a home for any in Britannia who wish to dwell in peace and safety,” she said over and over to knight after knight and to lord after lord.  Most of them accepted her word, especially after it had been repeated by Lords Jeor and Davos; but some grumbled and demanded personal audiences with the king, especially the testier lords who were now regretting promising their lands’ future allegiance to the sons of a Targaryen, even a Targaryen who had helped to save all of Britannia from the Saxons.

 

So every night, when Jon asked as he always did when they sat in his solar with Jon chewing roughly on his supper and Sansa sewing clothing for those among the smallfolk who needed it most, and when Jon took a moment to ask Sansa or her ladies needed aught, she would tell him which lords had asked for audiences with him.  He always agreed to see them, but his patience grew thinner each time, especially when the lord in question had made repeated requests for more and more of Londinium’s scarce resources to be sent off to his particular land with no regard, as Jon judged, for what the remaining Britons could spare.

 

“I have done with Lord Arryn’s haranguings,” he grumbled one night.  “He cares more for his coffers than for his own people.”  He yanked off his belt, causing his jerkin to swivel tightly to one side.

 

Sansa pursed her lips.  “Norfolk is a large territory,” she replied, pulling a string with more vigor than usual through one of the fur pelts Jon gave her every day from whatever wild wolves or bears or foxes he and his men had caught wandering too near to Londinium.  “My father said the Saxons laid particular waste to it.”

 

Jon shook his head.  “You have seen our ledgers,” he answered.  “I have allotted him as much as we can in proportion to his need.”

 

“Then hear him and reassure him that if he needs aught more, we shall do what we can to provide for him,” said Sansa, measuring her words carefully.  “A bit of assurance, even flattery, to a difficult one such as Lord Arryn is a small price to pay for his continued allegiance, especially considering he himself commands the allegiance of so many others.”

 

Jon blew out a sigh of sheer frustration.  “Aye, and what further price must I pay?” he demanded.  “He must understand – they all must – that the suffering of our own people here in Londinium must be relieved as well.  I care less about his ranting than about their lives, and he must see it.”  He pulled out the leather thong binding his wild curls away from his face and sat down abruptly on Sansa’s bed.

 

“No,” he continued.  “If he demands an audience with me tomorrow, I shall refuse it.  He and all the others must see I cannot be bought or swayed away from the welfare of those who need it most, especially not for the sake of their idiotic politics.”

 

Sansa rolled her eyes.  “Idiotic politics, if done correctly, can aid a realm more than harm it,” she replied.  “Keeping his favor is crucial, especially now, and merely listening to him without giving your word for further resources, even listening for an hour or two, could do that.  So if you wish to refuse him, do it yourself.  I will not do it for you.”  She lifted her chin and crossed her arms over her chest.

 

Jon stood up, stalked over to the fireplace, and prodded a log with more force than was necessary.  “Very well,” he sighed; but when he sat down on the bed again, he reached for Sansa much more tentatively than he had for the log rod, and he stroked her hair so tenderly, and his mouth was so gentle on her own that Sansa could not stay irritated at him; and the following morning, he remained abed long enough to kiss her on her forehead and wish her a good morning before he donned his clothing and rose to join his men in another day of toil.

 

All was well for a few days; but Lord Arryn and a few others remained particularly troublesome in their demands, and every day Jon met with one of them, his temper was shorter when he emerged from the audience, and he and Sansa repeated their bedtime arguments more and more often.

 

“One would think two demons instead of one spawned me, as they say,” he snapped one night after a particularly long session with Lord Baelish, a nettlesome little man who would not cease begging Jon for the control of a territory in Suffolk which Jon had already promised to his own men.

 

Sansa scoffed.  “They are grumblings, naught more,” she replied, rubbing her temples; she had had to deal with Lord Baelish and his adversary for two days solid before Jon would agree to hear the matter between them.  “And should you take more time to listen to your lords, they should see it more clearly.”

 

Jon whirled around, struck the solid stone mantel with both hands, and winced.  “And is not the work I do every day enough?” he cried.  “I tire of politics and petty quarrels.  Every roof my men and I build every day gives shelter to more people who should otherwise die in this winter.  I have not the time to risk their lives on the squabblings of fools!”

 

“Neither do I,” Sansa snapped back.  “I should rather spend all of my own time sewing more of the clothes I can make to keep those same people warm, but I must listen to the squabblings of fools if you will not, Jon Targaryen; and if you wish to show the rumors false, and yourself a king who will build as well as slaughter, then you must hear them as well!”

 

Jon’s mouth opened, and then shut, and his jaw tightened, and for a moment he blinked as if he would cry.  Then he whirled again and stalked out of the room.

 

Sansa sighed heavily and rubbed her temples harder.  She wished she could swallow her words out of the air into which she had spoken them, and she knew she should follow Jon to his chambers and ask his forgiveness for them; but her head hurt, and so did her pride, and she must finish sewing the cloak on which she was working, and Jon must know he was nothing like his father in truth.

 

But Jon did not bid her good morning the next day, and he stayed out working with his men later than usual that night; and although he asked her as always if any had requested audiences with him, and whether Sansa or her ladies was in want of anything, it was curtly done, and Sansa replied with equal stiffness.  The air between them chilled with the late winter winds every day, and for a time Jon did not ask to spend the night in Sansa’s chambers.  When next he did, she had just had her moon blood, and her body was still aching, and so was Jon’s head, and they argued again before he removed his jerkin and climbed into the bed.  When he reached out to touch her, she shifted and felt the ache again and flinched.  Jon withdrew his hand from her as if she had been an open flame, and pain flashed across his face, and his lower lip trembled by a hair’s breadth; and he left her chambers at once and did not return.

 

More days and weeks passed, and the winter with them; and one day, when the snows had fully melted to reveal a new Londinium studded with strong new dwellings and granaries, Jon had taken a party of his men off to the forest to hunt, for the castle’s stores had gotten dangerously low.  On her way to meet with the steward, Sansa overheard three of the kitchen maids whispering about how happy the king had looked on his way out of the gates.

 

“I should be happy to avoid Lord Arryn and Lord Baelish, if I were him,” said one girl.  Another rolled her eyes at her companion.

 

“Not so unhappy for you,” she retorted, “considering the way you ogle at him.”

 

The third girl giggled, much to the other’s chagrin.

 

“He should rather ogle at the queen than at you, Lena,” she rejoined.  “Certainly more than the king, for I have heard he has not visited the queen’s chambers in near a month.”

 

“Maybe he is happy to be leaving her behind, then,” the first girl said.  “She must have as little talent in the bedchamber as she has much at sewing, if he despises her bed that much.”

 

Sansa flinched and swept into the next hallway; and, try as she might, she could not quite forget the maids’ words, which sang over and over in her thoughts for the remainder of that day and the next, when Jon departed again to go hunting and did not return until after the moon had risen.

 

So when he said quietly on the third morning, “I shall return before sunset if you accompany me, my lady,” Sansa’s jaw dropped.

 

Was he offering her peace?  Had he decided to return to her bedchamber?  Perhaps he, too, had heard the servants’ gossip and meant to head it off by appearing on a public excursion with his wife?  But why would he want her to hunt?  Christ only knew she was no great hand at riding, let alone hunting.

 

“Not to hunt,” Jon continued, flushing just a bit.  “I thought we could perhaps have a picnic for you and your ladies and some of my men.  We discovered a pretty spot by a stream yesterday, and – ” He shrugged and the tips of his ears went red.  “I only thought you might enjoy it.”

 

So it was that not two hours later, the royal couple and their attendants galloped off into the forest just west of Londinium.  The sun shone brightly, and as they approached the woods, primroses and gillyflowers and lilies began to appear among the grass and the bushes.  Sansa could not help but smile, and at one point she stopped to pick a handful of the flowers.  When she mounted her horse again, however, Jon, who had been riding abreast of her and Lord Davos, was nowhere to be seen.

 

Sansa urged her horse to a faster pace, thinking Jon would be just ahead.  Sure enough, there he was, deep in some discussion or another with Davos and Jeor.  When greeted him, he nodded and gave her a brief, “My lady,” and then turned back to Jeor.  He gestured in the direction of a spot off to their right before turning back in his saddle to face Sansa.

 

“We shall gallop anon, my lady,” he said.  “You and your ladies may keep at your own pace; we wish to ride on ahead and shall not disturb you.”

 

They galloped off, and Sansa sighed, her shoulders sagging into a most unqueenly posture.  So it must be as she had thought, then; Jon had no care for her, only for the gossip.  Perhaps he would never return to her bedchambers to pepper her with his kisses and caresses, or his arguments, or his armfuls of pelts and new rushes for her floor, and –

 

“My lady, are you well?”  Lady Jeyne Poole asked at her side.  Sansa swallowed against the lump in her throat and nodded.

 

“I wish to ride alone for some time,” she said when she could form the words.  “I shall gather what flowers I can to make us crowns for the picnic.  You and the others should do the same, Jeyne, and I shall meet you before the sun reaches mid-morning at the ridge yonder.”

 

She pointed toward a gentle slope in the ground some hundreds of yards away.  Jeyne opened her mouth, but thought better of whatever she had been about to say and nodded.

 

So Sansa urged her mount off just a bit further into the woods, where there was no Jeyne or anybody else to see the tears streaming down her cheeks.  Flowers of all colors and sizes now surrounded her; but seeing the blue roses reminded her of Northumbria, which she had left behind.  Seeing the lilies of the valley made her think of the creamy white gown she had worn to wed Jon, and of their first night together, when he had touched her so gently and taken such care to cause her as little pain as he could.  Seeing the primroses reminded her of how Jon’s face flushed when he argued a particularly sore point.  And there was the hillock lace, which resembled Jon’s face with the color drained out of it when she had flung his lineage back into his face and implied he was as bad as his father, and how thoroughly he had ignored her after that, and how stubborn he was, worse than a mule, unyielding as the thousand-year-old oak trees of Northumbria’s great forests and every bit as unfeeling –

 

So thoroughly was Sansa engrossed in her thoughts that she failed to notice the fallen tree branch blocking the way in front of her.  She only felt her horse give way in front of her, and her hands close on thin air as she reached vainly for its bridle, and the painful thump of her back against the ground just before her head lolled back to meet it, and then she knew no more.

 

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“My king, I’m sorry, but we can’t find her.”

 

Jon whirled to face a very apologetic Lord Samwell Tarly, whose face was paler than usual.  Beside him were several of Sansa’s ladies.  All of their faces were whiter than Sam’s, if possible.

 

“She said she would meet us on yonder ridge at mid-morning,” piped up Lady Jeyne Poole, her voice trembling.  “We came, but she did not, and we found Lord Sam and told him, and he and your men came to our aid, but we cannot find her.”

 

Jon stared at her as his heart first slowed nearly to a stop, then started racing faster than a horse.  Sansa had not seemed happy about accompanying him, and he could not entirely blame her for it.  After all, he had avoided her much – too much, he admitted to himself – since they had last fought.  It had pained him to no end to think she thought him anything like his father, and he had taken some time to lick his wounds.  When Sam had told him about the rumors being whispered about among the servants, rumors that he shunned his wife and her bed because she was too dull, or nagged at him like a harpy, or demanded too many things for her rooms, or failed to attend to her wifely duties in favor of her sewing and hearing petitions and doing tasks a lady should know to leave to her husband, he felt first crushed, then angry, then determined.  He would show Sansa that he was nothing like his father, if that was what she needed, and he would begin by giving her things she loved; for if lemon cake was out of his reach, her favorite sweetmeats were not, nor now were the spring flowers.  So he and his men spent two days bringing in game the cooks could cure, and then he arranged a picnic, which he and his lords had ridden ahead of Sansa and her ladies to prepare.

 

But now Sansa was nowhere to be found.

 

Lady Jeyne had said she had ridden off alone and looked unhappy.  Did she hate the thought of being in his presence so much now?  Had she gone off into the woods alone to be rid of him, and possibly everyone else, so she could weep or gather flowers or do whatever she liked in peace and purposefully ignore him for the rest of the day?  But no; she would not break her word to her ladies, no matter what she felt about him.

 

A cold knot formed in the pit of Jon’s stomach.  Something must be terribly wrong.

 

He wanted to leave the whole damned party behind and run through the forest as fast as he could, screaming her name aloud, and not stop until he found her and held her in his arms.  Christ above, he would take assistance from Lord Arryn, even Lord Baelish, if it meant finding her more quickly.  Instead, he took a deep breath to calm the knot in his stomach and enable himself to speak.

 

“To your horses,” he ordered the men around him.  “Lady Jeyne, you shall come with us and show us exactly where you saw the queen riding last.  Sam, Grenn, Pypar – ” he nodded to three of his youngest lords in turn – “you shall stay here with the provisions and the rest of Sansa’s ladies.  I shall return by sunset, if not sooner.”

 

He threw himself into his mount’s saddle, took the reins, and wiggled his toes with impatience until the Lady Jeyne and the other lords had mounted their own horses.

 

“That direction, you say, Lady Jeyne?” he asked, and Lady Jeyne, now wiping tears from her cheeks, nodded.  Jon pivoted his horse and galloped off as though every demon in hell were after him.

 

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Sansa’s head throbbed in time with the movements of the horse beneath her.  She moaned and tried to turn in the saddle, but instead her face met a cloth-covered wall.  She pushed away, but flopped forward and would have fallen had not someone grabbed her from behind.

 

“She’s waking, milady,” said a rough voice from directly behind her.  Sansa gasped and tried to open her eyes.  But it was night, and she could barely make out the shapes of a few trees around her and, when she turned, the chest of a tall man whose beard nearly scraped her face.  He was, she saw, the one holding her, and his eyes gleamed almost merrily down at her in the moonlight.

 

Sansa tried to scream, but only a rasping sigh emerged, and her head nearly burst with the effort.  She tried to push the man away, but he only held her more tightly.

 

“Sir Beric!”  A woman’s voice, low and throaty, made the man turn in his saddle and Sansa with him.  The horse halted, and a hooded figure walked over to them.  It was a woman, and she reached into her robes, removed a small bottle, uncorked it, and held it up to Sansa’s lips.

 

“Drink, my lady,” she said.  “For the pain.  And you – ”  Her voice sharpened, and she raised her head to speak to the man behind Sansa.  “Not a hair on her head.”

 

Sansa felt the man nod behind her.  “Aye, milady,” he said, clearly chastened.

 

The woman’s eyes gleamed under her hood as she gave him a fierce stare at which Sansa cringed.  Then she turned back to Sansa.

 

“Drink,” she said again.  Sansa shook her head, but the woman pinched her chin with surprising strength and poured a hot, pungent liquid down Sansa’s throat.  It tasted of mead and earth and how Sansa imagined honey would taste if it rotted, and she moaned in protest before the darkness took her again.

 

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The next time Sansa awoke, she found herself in an ancient stone courtyard surrounded by equally ancient walls with moss in their cracks.  Someone took her horse’s bridle, and before she knew it, she was being handed off the horse to a stocky, middle-aged knight with thinning sandy hair.  A woman robed all in red swept to his side.

 

“Can you stand, Your Grace?” she asked, addressing Sansa, and Sansa recognized her voice as that of the woman from the night before.  Sansa felt like collapsing in a heap and perhaps vomiting as well; but her father had taught her and Robb never to let an enemy see one’s weaknesses, and she was not about to begin now.

 

“I can stand, and I wish to leave,” she said as loudly as she could.  The woman merely smiled.

 

“The last is not possible,” she said, as if pointing out that the sky was covered with the thick, gray clouds that now obscured the sun.  “We are well hidden here, and here is your purpose.”

 

“My purpose?” Sansa stared at her and felt the knight who had shared her horse approach her other side.  She scolded herself for not turning and running while she could, but a quick backward glance revealed a heavy set of iron-barred wood gates, which two other knights were now fastening shut.

 

“The Lord of Light has a purpose for all,” replied the woman, her voice lowering to a singsong lilt.  “His king awaits you inside.”

 

Each of the knights took one of Sansa’s arms.  That was when the fear struck her harder than her head had struck the ground when she had fallen from her horse; but she lifted her chin, set her jaw, and spoke no words as the men escorted her inside.

 

The red woman led them through a series of chambers and into a long room with an enormous hearth on each side and a platform at the end.  There, sitting on a stone chair, sat a middle-aged man.  He was garbed all in brown, and his weary face was topped with bushy, severe eyebrows and a gold crown with a ruby in the shape of a heart adorning the center.  When he saw the approaching party, he rose.  The red woman nodded to him, and he to her; but both knights bowed, dragging Sansa to the floor with him.

 

“Enough.”  The man’s voice was reedy but stern, and the knights stood at once, again pulling Sansa with them.  He made a short motion with one hand, and they released her and stepped back.  Sansa’s legs shook, and for a moment she thought she would fall, until she managed to plant her right foot onto the stone floor and move the left to stand beside it.

 

“My apologies, Sansa Stark,” said the man.  “I gave orders that you be handled gently.  I trust my men obeyed them.”  He glanced sideways at the red woman, who gave a single nod.

 

“Welcome to Glastonbury Castle,” the man went on, and Sansa could not stifle a gasp.  Glastonbury Castle was in the heart of Somerset, the home of the Baratheon family, who had fortified themselves behind the crags and swamplands that surrounded their land during the Saxons’ invasions.  They had ridden out neither with nor against the Saxons in favor of barricading themselves in what safety they could find.  The man in front of Sansa could be no other than Lord Stannis Baratheon, last surviving son of King Steffon Baratheon.  King Steffon had been nearly as famous a warrior as Rhaegar Targaryen in his day; but his son had foregone war in favor of forming his own kingdom away from the Saxon incursions.  His wife had died some years previously – due, some rumors said, to the witchcraft that Stannis and his men practiced, red witchcraft from the heathen lands far to the east.  Sansa’s eyes darted to the black filigree necklace adorning the neck of the red woman.  In the middle sat an enormous ruby, lit from within as by fire.  _Fire from hell_ , Sansa remembered the rumors whispering about the source of Stannis Baratheon’s power; and she could not help but shudder.

 

“You have nothing to fear from us, Your Grace,” said the red woman, and Sansa forced herself to look upward into the woman’s dark eyes.  “Indeed, we offer you the queenship of Somerset in keeping with your birth, and queenship at length of all Britannia.”

 

Stannis Baratheon cleared his throat.  “The Lady Melisandre means to say,” he said gruffly, “that you will be my wife.  My daughter Shireen has lacked a mother too long; and I mean to have sons to take my throne and the throne of Britannia after I am gone.”

 

Sansa’s eyes widened.  “My right name,” she said when she could speak again, “is Sansa Targaryen.  I am the wife of King Jon Targaryen, King of Britannia, and therefore I cannot marry you.”

 

She prided herself on how calm she sounded; but both the lord and lady gave her pitying smiles, as if indulging the fantastical whims of a child.

 

“You have borne Jon Targaryen no children,” said the Lady Melisandre, “and your marriage can easily be set aside.  And he has not the firm allegiance of all his lords, who can be persuaded easily enough to follow the only king who could defend his own people from the Saxons – especially a king with a beautiful wife and sons.”  She smiled at Sansa, who felt her blood run cold.

 

“My husband will not allow this,” she said, her voice beginning to shake.  “He is a mighty warrior, and he has more allegiance than you think; and he will not give me up.”

 

This time, both the lord and the lady laughed.  Sansa pursed her lips together so tightly that she felt the blood drain from them.

 

“If I am told aright,” said Lord Stannis, “he has not favored your company for some time; and if he has no sons by Ned Stark’s daughter, his agreement with the lords of Britannia is null and void, and he will certainly lose their allegiance.”

 

“So,” said Lady Melisandre smoothly, “if you will but sign a letter to Jon Targaryen to this effect, and marry King Stannis, he shall negotiate a new agreement with the other lords; and you shall bear him sons, and mother his daughter Shireen, and be queen of all Britannia.”

 

“You are mad,” Sansa bit out, before remembering that such a flat refusal might anger the king and make him recant his instructions that his men were to cause her no harm.  She bit her lip and took a deep breath.

 

“Or,” she continued, “perhaps you underestimate my husband’s willingness to win me back.  He might pay a fine ransom for me; and with it you, my l – Your Grace, might win yourself a bride from Brittany or Burgundy, and the allegiance of her house, and prosper your own kingdom through your trade and relations with them.”

 

The king frowned.  “No,” he said, “it must be you, Sansa Stark; for you are the daughter of Ned Stark, and the North of Britannia will not have peace with us unless I win their alliance through you.”

 

“You are of the blood of Britannia’s kings,” said the Lady Melisandre, her eyes glowing to match her pendant.  Sansa shrank back.  “Only the blood of those kings can return Glastonbury to its prosperity and power.  Yes, you it must be.” She smiled in a way that made Sansa’s blood run cold.  “And this place is well hidden.  You may rest assured that Jon Targaryen will not find it.”  She nodded to a young man standing next to the king, who drew from his robes two pieces of parchment and a long quill.

 

“Will you sign the letter?” the woman asked, taking both from the man and holding them out to Sansa.  Sansa stood her ground and shook her head.

 

“No,” she replied.  “My husband shall come for me.”

 

She dearly hoped it was the case as the two knights marched her off into the depths of the castle; for what if the Lady Melisandre was indeed a woman of the dark arts and had managed some sorcery to hide Glastonbury Castle?  How long would that sorcery last?  And what – Sansa gulped back tears as one of the knights knocked at a set of doors, which was promptly opened by a young maid dressed in brown and scarlet – what if Jon, after some time of looking for her, decided she was not worth the effort, and he would rather have a wife who did not fight with him so much as she did?

 

Sansa heard none of the words the flock of maids surrounding her spoke.  She barely recognized it when one of them asked her if she should like a bath; and the moment the water was brought, she ordered them out of the room, climbed into the tub, and wept.

 

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Every day after that, Sansa rose to let her new maids dress her in a gown in some variation of brown or red.  She had never liked either color; instead, she had preferred green and blue.  Jon had remarked a few times when she wore a particular blue gown back in Londinium or Cornwall that it made her eyes look pretty.  The tips of his ears had reddened each time he had said it; but his eyes had been so wonderfully soft, like his lips when he had kissed her.  Sansa tried to blink back the tears that sprang into her eyes every time she thought of it.

 

Aside from dressing and undressing, she was allowed only to read and sew.  The day after she arrived at the castle, she met Lord Stannis’s daughter, Shireen, a child of perhaps ten years.  Half of her face was covered in scars; but she was nonetheless a pretty little thing, and very courteous, and when she found that Sansa liked to read, she asked if they could do it together.  So it was that Sansa spent many of her afternoons listening to the child read any number of tales, and one or two of them were favorites of Jon’s, and when Shireen read them Sansa had to face the window so no one would see the tears pouring out of her eyes.  When Shireen left, she would insist on sewing alone; for sewing made her think of the nights she had spent with Jon in front of her chambers’ roaring fires, and how he had entered them carrying furs for her sewing and rushes for her floor, and even more wood for their fires.  Sansa had half-scolded him, telling him one of the men could handle such things; but he had said a husband should take care of his wife, king or no king.

 

Twice a day, once after she broke her fast and once after supper, she had an audience with Lord Stannis and Lady Melisandre, who asked her if she had changed her mind.  Sansa always gave them her firmest no, and hoped dearly that Jon was near to finding her; for although both lord and lady accepted her answers, and though they ordered no ill-treatment of her, Sansa could not be sure they would not at some point turn to such tactics to get their way.  The uncertainty of it hung over her day and night, and the only time she escaped the gnawing feeling was during the last minutes before she undressed for bed, when she finished her sewing with a stitch of golden thread, so that she could keep count of the days she spent in Glastonbury, and especially so that she could show them to Jon and tell him she had not forgotten him any more than she hoped he had forgotten her.

 

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“Your Grace, with respect, I agree with Lord Jeor.”  Lord Royce’s commanding voice echoed off the stones of the great hall.  “You have searched thirty acres and more about the place where Queen Sansa disappeared these past ten days, and yet you have found no trace of her.  What makes you think she can be found within forty or fifty?”

 

Jon rounded on the man, barely restraining a snarl.  “She is my wife and queen,” he replied.  “What good were my vows to protect her if I cannot find her to be protected?”

 

“Aye,” sounded Lord Pypar’s soft voice near his elbow, “but, Your Grace, what if she does not wish to be found?”

 

Jon stared at the man, his mouth agape.  Lord Pypar grimaced and said nothing more until Lord Arryn spoke up.

 

“You have said yourself that you found no trace of her,” he said.  “Often such a thing means that the one who vanished did so of a purpose.  Perhaps she has returned to Northumbria and her father.”

 

Jon’s eyes crackled with anger.  “You of all should not presume to speak of this to me, my lord,” he spat.  “You imply your queen to be a coward or a turncoat when she is neither.  She fortified and held Tintagel Castle against my return for months before we fought the Saxons, and she has provided for your people and borne your vicious and frivolous complaints with far greater patience than you deserve.”  He gritted his teeth against the heaving of his chest.  “Speak another word of this and you may leave Londinium, to keep my counsel no more.  Nor any others of you.”  He turned in half a circle to spread his glare about the room.  “Lords Tarly, Heathwell, and Horn – ” he inclined his head in turn at Samwell, Pypar, and Grenn – “ride at dawn tomorrow, and as many days after that as we must in order to find my wife.”

 

“Aye, and what about your people, Your Grace?”  This time it was Jeor Mormont who spoke.  Jon turned to face the man as though the latter had just stuck a knife into his back.

 

“They need to have their petitions heard and their needs seen to,” Lord Mormont continued, “and a leader in the event of any further attacks.  The kingdom needs its king.  Its king must not lose it.”

 

His eyes shone with warning and concern; but Jon’s own flashed back with anger. 

 

“Then you and Lord Seaworth may arrange for it, Lord Mormont,” he ground out.  “You have my full permission to do these things as long as it takes me to find Sansa.  The kingdom is no kingdom at all without its queen.”

 

He turned on his heels and stalked out of the room, realizing only later that he had referred then to Sansa before all the lords by her first name only, as he had always addressed her in private, when they sat together in her chambers or his solar and Sansa sewed and hummed and sometimes even smiled at him, when she allowed him into her bed and let him kiss and caress her heavenly body and bury his head into her shoulder as his body entwined itself with hers over and over and over again.

 

Jon reached his chambers and yanked on his sword belt so hard that it snapped in two.  He cursed loudly and yanked even harder on his jerkin, ripping it off too.  What if Sansa truly did not want to be found?  What if she had thought him so much like his father that she would deceive him, break her word to her ladies, and run as far away from him as she could go?

 

Jon’s finger hooked into the leather thong that bound his hair and ripped it free, howling as it caught a vicious snarl in his curls.  He could not think of it any more.  He could not bear it.

 

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Sansa gazed listlessly out of the window of her chambers.  Autumn was waning over Britannia, and it was nearing a year’s turn since she had married Jon.  She remembered him promising her a lemon cake when the day arrived.  She remembered how she could not help smiling, even though it had been their wedding day and she had been anxious and afraid, before he had taken her to bed so gently and shown her she need never fear him.  She remembered him never failing to ask every day they lived together whether she and her ladies had all they needed, no matter how tired he was or how overwhelmed with other duties.

 

“Your Grace?”

 

Sansa turned to see little Shireen standing at the doorway, a book in her hands.

 

“May I read with you?” the girl asked, and Sansa, not trusting her voice, nodded.  The child’s face brightened at once, and she rushed to seat herself in her customary chair, carefully opened the book, and began to read.  Sansa, however, paid little attention.  She was too busy remembering how Jon smiled when she thanked him for supplying her with more furs, or when he spied the flowers he had whittled for her out of sticks adorning her bedside table, or when she assented to him coming to bed with her; and how gentle his lips and hands were, and how awestruck he looked the first time she removed her shift for him altogether, and –

 

“Your Grace?”

 

Little Shireen’s voice pulled Sansa out of her reverie, and she bent to regard the child’s questioning face.

 

“Yes, Shireen,” she asked.

 

“My Papa says you shall marry him and become my mother before the spring comes,” said the child.  “Is it true?”

 

Tears flooded Sansa’s eyes, and she blinked desperately to keep them from rolling down her cheeks.

 

“We shall see,” was all she could say.

 

  _Please, Christ above, defeat this witch’s enchantment,_ she prayed, sinking to her knees on the floor after the girl and her maids had left the room. _Let Jon find me.  Let me repent to him of my words, even if he does not forgive me for years._

 

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“Jon, we’ve already been to this place before.”

 

Jon turned to Lord Samwell Tarly, who was just behind him.  Outside the company of the other lords, Jon, Sam, Pypar, and Grenn had long addressed each other without formality, for they had grown up with him in Brittany since all four were but children.

 

Jon stared in the direction Sam was pointing.  Three trees stood slightly apart from the others at the bottom of a small hill.  He cursed as he remembered seeing the same sight the prior day.

 

“I see, Sam,” he barked.  “We shall turn the horses and go opposite to find a different path.”

 

Grenn sighed.  “We said the same thing yesterday,” he pointed out, “and the day before at the forked oak, and then last week back at the river, and last _month_ – ”

 

“Aye, Grenn, I know,” Jon interrupted him.  “That doesn’t mean we can’t turn back and try again.”

 

“Jon.”  Sam’s voice was so low that Jon had to step to his side to hear it.  The young lord gestured toward the brook behind him.

 

“It’s the same one as we crossed when we first entered the forest more than a moon’s turn ago, do you not think?” he murmured.

 

Jon stared hard at the stream of muddy water.  His heart sank as he recognized a knot of oak trees near the edge.  He cursed again.

 

“Aye.”  Sam nodded.  “But the sun is in a completely different place in relation to the brook, Jon.  The brook shouldn’t even be here.”  His brown eyes shone with fear.  “I would say we have been making one large circle this entire time, except that the sun is different.  Jon – ” his voice lowered to a whisper, “the priests say there are no such things, but I’d call this an enchantment.  I doubt if there is a way for us to escape back to Londinium now.”

 

Jon stared at him in horror.  During his boyhood, he would have agreed with the priests; but as soon as he had pulled Dark Sister out of the stone near the site of his father’s death, he had believed altogether differently.  The air felt suddenly cold around him, and he shivered.

 

“Get Pyp and Grenn,” he ordered Sam.  “Let us see if any way forward can be found.  Not back to Londinium, Sam – forward.”

 

Sam sighed heavily and turned to retrieve the other two lords.  Jon leaned his body into his tired horse’s saddle, bent his head to rest flat against the leather, and prayed with all his might that the God his people swore had guided his hand against the Saxons could break the enchantment and, more than that, protect Sansa from whatever evil effects the power behind it was trying to work on her. 

 

 _Sansa,_ he murmured over and over again, until he felt Sam shaking his shoulder.  _Sansa._

_Sansa,_ he whispered with the wind that brought the first snowflakes of winter swirling around them.  He remembered her telling him how she and her brother would hold their mouths open and catch snowflakes on their tongues as children.  He remembered her smiling when she said it, and laughing when she and her father’s men had tried to teach his bumbling southern lords the Northumbrians’ traditional snowflake dance, a light, whirling number danced in all Northumbrian halls every night from the falling of the first snowflake of the winter to the last melt of spring.  She had even smiled at Lord Arryn and Lord Baelish, who certainly had always regarded him with more favor than they had him.

  
Perhaps she had been right, he admitted to himself as he drew his cloak about him, or at least more in the right than he.  If he had followed her advice and suffered another few audiences he had not wished to grant, perhaps she would have thought differently of his resemblance to his father.  Perhaps she would not have flinched at his touch when he had gone to her bed that last time.  Perhaps she would have stayed to have a picnic with him that horrible day when everything had gone wrong.  Perhaps she would have seen how much he missed her smiles, and her sewing cloaks for children who had none in front of the fire, and her astonishing memory of how much the castle had in its stores every day and how much game and how many furs he and his men must bring in so the people of Londinium could eat and breathe and live day after day.

 

 _Sansa,_ he whispered at night as he, Sam, Pypar, Grenn, and their growling stomachs huddled shivering in their cloaks around a dying fire.  He thought of her smile again, and the warmth of her beautiful body, and the heat in her eyes as she told him she would not be made a messenger of his disgruntlement to the lords he should be facing like the king he was. 

 

He felt like a king no longer.  He cared about being a king no longer, or at the least very little.

 

What good, after all, was he or his kingdom without Sansa?

 

 _Sansa,_ he whispered again, and, before he even realized he had spoken the words, _Sansa, my love._

 

He felt a sudden warmth, like the flicker of a candle under his hand, at the base of the fourth finger of his left hand.  Groaning, he pushed his cloak loose enough to look at it.

 

The sapphire in the middle of the gold ring had begun to glow at the center.  Jon stared at it, shocked, and rose to his feet before he had realized it.  The glow intensified.

 

“Sam,” rasped Jon, nudging the other man with his foot.  “Pyp!  Grenn!”

 

It took some time to awaken them all, and more for them to focus their weary eyes on the icy stone glowing on Jon’s hand, and yet more for them to get up and saddle their horses, grumbling all the while.  Jon nudged his own horse this way and that, watching astonished as the sapphire glowed either more or less brightly depending on the direction the animal turned.

 

Finally, he settled on the direction that brightened the stone the most, and urged his friends on against the freezing wind.

 

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Sansa woke before dawn.  In her sleep, she had drawn her blankets so tightly around her that for a blissful moment she thought they were Jon’s arms, and sighed in delight.

 

Jon wanted to return to her bed.  Jon must have forgiven her for her harshness and her ungratefulness.  Jon was holding her again.  Jon –

 

Sansa felt a sudden burning sensation against the fourth finger of her left hand, still encircled by Jon’s marriage ring.  She wrangled it from the covers and sighed with disappointment once she realized that she was not in Jon’s arms at all, but in her captive bed at Glastonbury Castle.

 

Then she saw the glowing red stone in the middle of the ring and clapped her hand to her mouth to stifle a scream.

 

The stone was an ordinary ruby; that much she knew, for Jon had told her about it when he had given it to her at their wedding.  It had belonged to his mother, he had said, and she had told him before she died to give it to the woman he married.  She had occasionally noticed the stone glimmering in the sunlight, but now it was glowing in the dark like a dancing flame.

 

 _Jon,_ she sighed without thinking.  Then her heart leapt.

 

What if Jon had found her after all?

 

But when she scrambled out of bed to stare out the window, she only saw the faint light of the stars and the gray of early dawn beginning to creep over the sky.  The torches burned low in the courtyard below her.  There was no sign of Jon, or indeed of anyone else.

 

Sansa sighed.  It was foolishness to hope Jon had come after all this time.  Perhaps the light emanating from the stone was all a trick of her mind, a bitter echo of her dearest wish.

 

 _Jon,_ she whispered as she sank back down onto her bed and let the tears flow down her cheeks.  _Jon, my love._

 

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The next evening, Lord Stannis and Lady Melisandre did not summon her to her usual audience with them after supper.  Instead, just a bit before sunset, Sansa heard the shuffling of at least a dozen pairs of feet passing her door on their way down the hall.

 

A stab of terrible hope pierced Sansa’s heart.  She sent her ladies to fetch her a bath.  As soon as they had left her bedchamber, she scurried to the window and stared down at the courtyard.  Two knights rushed across it, carrying torches, and yet two more scuttled after them.  Sansa waited by the window with bated breath for several minutes until the antechamber doors opened to admit Lord Stannis and Lady Melisandre themselves into the courtyard.  When they reached the other end, they huddled together with the lord’s knights and spoke for several moments.  Then Lady Melisandre turned back toward the castle, and Sansa ducked to avoid her keen eyesight, but not before she made out the words _Jon Targaryen_ on the woman’s lips.

 

Sansa’s heart leaped into her throat just as one of her maids re-entered the room with a jug of water.  It was Rose, her youngest maid, and Rose was exactly what she needed, she realized as she turned to address the girl.

 

“I am not yet ready for the bath, Rose,” she said.  “The water for my last bath was far too hot when it was first poured, and I am afraid this may be the same.  Do you very much mind trying it out for me?”  She gestured toward the girl’s clothes.  “You may get in all the way if you so wish.  I do not mind.”

 

Rose looked a bit confused, but curtsied anyway.  “Yes, milady,” she said, and darted into the next room.

 

Sansa felt a bit guilty for taking advantage of the poor girl’s dullness, but once she had ensured the maid was fully immersed in the bath and facing the room’s other wall, she made sure to leave her own rich clothes behind after the stole the maid’s.  She could at least ensure the girl got to keep them.

 

The heat Sansa had felt on her skin beneath her ring intensified as she darted into the hallway, and when she looked down, the stone was glowing even more brilliantly than it had done the prior morning.  She stumbled as best she could through the castle’s halls, trying to remember the way she had come in nearly a year ago before she realized that that way would not do anyhow.  She waited in a corner until she saw two kitchen maids approaching, then followed them into the kitchens and scuttled behind yet another maid who was passing out the door into the chicken yard.  Gasping, she hid in the darkened far corner of the yard and waited until the guard had turned away from her before heaving herself up over the wall.  Two of her fingernails caught and broke in the cracks between the bricks as Sansa used them for leverage, and when she dropped off the top of the wall, she landed in a gorse-bush and hummed in pain as its thorns tore holes in her clothes and skin.  But _Jon, Jon, Jon_ was still the highest thought in her head, and to its tune she tore herself painfully free of the thorns and stumbled around the corner of the castle toward the sound of voices.  She emerged into a grove of bushes just to one side of the courtyard and saw four ragged-looking men standing in front of the door, which was open but guarded by four armored men.  Lord Stannis and Lady Melisandre stood just in front of them, regarding the strangers fiercely.

 

“She can hardly be called your wife if she wishes the marriage annulled, for she has borne you no sons or daughters,” Lord Stannis was saying, and one of the men stepped forward.  The guards crossed their swords to bar his way, and the man growled; and Sansa’s heart leapt as she recognized both the deep timbre of his voice and the curls that sprang in a gnarled mass off his head.

 

“And what proof have I that she wishes it so?” Jon demanded.  “I will see her now, and hear it from her own lips; and if you have harmed her, Lord Baratheon – ”

 

“He is ‘Your Grace’ to you, Jon Targaryen,” said Lady Melisandre, and Jon growled again.  “He took no part in the pact the other lords of Britannia made with you, as you well know.  He is the King of Glastonbury, and his sons with the queen will be the king and princes of Britannia; for His Grace’s family has been her since long before you and your father were born, and how long do you think your men will follow a foreigner above a Briton born and raised?”

 

“I care not if he wishes to be called a king,” Jon replied, and Sansa heard him measure his breaths as he sometimes did when he would as soon shout at a lord as speak to him.  “If a title is what you wish, Stannis Baratheon, then a title you may have; but I have made vows before my God to my wife.  If you release her to me and she has suffered no harm, my men and I will leave you and yours in peace; save only for the witch at your side, for her grievous enchantments have kept us wandering through wood and snow and ice and thorn, away from our kingdom and our families, for the space of a year.  She shall be tried and punished as my justiciars see fit.”

 

Sansa crept a bit closer, until she could see the profile of Jon’s face in the firelight.  It was smeared with dirt and blood alike, and she saw deep scratches that her fingers ached to bind.  He must have faced far worse thorns than she had.

 

Then she heard a laugh that made her bones quake; and Lady Melisandre stepped forward until she was close enough to breathe on Jon’s face.  Despite her laughter, Sansa thought the woman looked a bit uncertain; but her voice betrayed no hint of it.

 

“You may attempt to try and punish me, Jon Targaryen,” she hissed, “but you will fail and you will fall, and your men with you.  You should be grateful I have suffered you to pass this far.”

 

Jon ignored her and turned back to Stannis Baratheon.

 

“I say again, my lord,” he said, “that if you have not harmed my wife, release her to me and I will treat with you, for your house and mine have no quarrel, and I would deal and prosper with you now that the Saxons have met their end.  All I ask is for the fair trial, in front of my men and yours, of this woman.”  He gestured to the Lady Melisandre, who grinned at him cruelly.

 

“You should leave, Jon Targaryen,” she said.  “Your wife is beyond your reach.  You and yours should go before I change my mind.”

 

“Enough!”  Jon roared.  “Where is Sansa?  If you have harmed her, witch, you shall pay, no matter what else you may do!”

 

He lunged forward, but one of the guards struck him in the stomach, and he doubled over, wheezing.  Sansa shrieked and ran forward.  Before she could reach his side, however, one of his companions grabbed her by the arm.  It was Lord Samwell Tarly, she realized after a moment of staring through the grime and blood on his face.

 

“Lord Tarly, unhand me!” she cried.  “I have not been harmed!  Jon!  I am here!”

 

Jon and his companions turned to face her at once.  Lord Stannis and Lady Melisandre did the same.  Everyone except the red woman looked both shocked and bewildered.  Jon stared at her as he would have done a stranger who had accosted him on the road.

 

“Who are you, girl?” he asked.  “I do not know you.”

 

Sansa frantically scrubbed at her face, where she supposed the dirt and blood from the gorse-bush had gathered.

 

“’Tis me, Jon!” she cried.  “Sansa!  Your wife!”

 

Jon only shook his head, and so did his companions.  Sansa stared from man to man frantically, willing them to recognize her.  Her eye caught the Lady Melisandre’s face, which was adorned with a foul expression of triumph.

 

It must be the enchantment, she thought, and two tears scrolled out of her eyes and down her cheeks.  The witch had enchanted not just the woodlands of Glastonbury, but the captive herself; and now Jon did not know her, and could not know how desperately she had waited and hoped for him.  She tried to blink the rest of her tears back, and as she did a red flash caught her eye; and there on Jon’s left hand was the marriage ring she had given him, and the sapphire was shining like a tongue of icy flame.  Sansa threw off her cloak and held out her own hand, lit by the glowing ruby on her own marriage ring, to grasp her husband’s.

 

“Jon, look at my hand!” she cried.  “You gave me this ring on our wedding day, and it began shining when you came near, and I want no annulment, because I have waited for you, if you will have me – Jon, I am sorry!”

 

Jon’s eyes widened, and he clutched her hand and stared at her ring; and when he raised his eyes to her own, they were wet and disbelieving and overjoyed.  He seized her in his arms and lifted her off the ground and buried his face into her shoulder, and Sansa breathed in the pine and salt and warmth of him and shut her eyes.  A shriek of horror opened them again promptly, and Jon nearly dropped her; and they both turned just in time to see the ruby in Lady Melisandre’s necklace split down the middle as she clutched at it in vain, and the necklace crumbled to ash.  The witch’s face sprouted wrinkles and lines, and her hair turned white as snow; and her frame shriveled, and her robes fell off it, and she collapsed on the ground, a corpse that looked a thousand years old.  Stannis Baratheon gave a loud wail and collapsed to his knees next to her, weeping; and the guards, stunned, stepped back and allowed Jon to carry his wife into the shelter of the castle’s walls.

 

-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-

 

“Will he be fit to resume his duties before we leave, do you think?” Jon asked Sansa once the stricken lord’s attendants had carried him off to his chambers and attended to the witch’s bones.  They were seated in an antechamber eating bread and meat from the kitchens; but Jon would only use one hand to eat, and clung to his wife with the other.  She smiled faintly.

 

“I do not know,” she answered.  “He has a nephew at Somerset Castle two days’ march west, however; and we can send for him if need be.”

 

Jon nodded and looked down, as he had been doing so frequently, at Sansa’s left hand.  “When did it begin to shine?” he asked, and Sansa blushed.

 

“Just a day ago,” she answered, “when I awoke thinking of you and how much I wished to be back with you.”

 

Jon stared at her in wonder.  “You truly did not wish to leave me?” he asked, his voice down to a whisper.  Sansa shook her head at once.

 

“I never wanted to leave you, Jon,” she whispered back.  “I only fell off my horse, and she must have taken me while I was asleep from it, and – Jon, do not trouble yourself with what either of them said.  I love you.”  She stroked a curl off his cheek and gave him a trembling smile.  “I think the stone must have begun shining once I realized it.”

 

Jon held up his own hand.  “So did mine,” he admitted.  “We were out in the middle of the forest, lost, in the winter, or what we thought was the winter in her enchantment, and I wanted nothing more than to have you with me so I could tell you how sorry I was for how ill I showed you I loved you, and…”  He shrugged.  “I felt the warmth of it on my finger, and when I looked it was glowing, and it glowed more brightly the closer I got to you.”

 

Sansa lightly rubbed his face next to a particularly deep scratch.  “Oh, Jon,” she murmured.  “How many acres of thorns did she force you through before you found me?”

 

He shrugged again.  “It matters not, my love,” he said, his eyes shining almost as brightly as his ring.  “I would go through them ten times more, if it meant you would come home with me and stay, and let me be a far better husband to you than I was before.”

 

He still looked unsure, as if she might vanish in front of him; and Sansa shook her head.

 

“You were always a good husband to me, Jon Targaryen,” she said.  “It was not your own fault that I failed to see it as I do now, my love; and of course I will go home with you.  I even think I shall stay.”

 

Her lips twisted into a japing grin, and Jon’s face split into the widest smile Sansa had ever seen.

 

“For true, at your word?” he asked just before his lips descended to take her own.

 

“For true, at my word,” she murmured, brushing her nose with his as her lips opened eagerly under his.  “For true, and for always.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is not a conventional Arthur-Guinevere romance. Rather, I based it on an incident in Caradoc of Llancarfan’s Life of Gildas, in which Melwas, king of the “Summer Country” (possibly meaning Somerset), kidnaps Guinevere. Arthur spends a year searching for her and assembles an army to attack Melwas and free Guinevere. In Caradoc’s account, the British saint Gildas negotiates a truce and facilitates Guinevere’s rescue, but in this story, our lord and lady have built just as much of a wall between themselves as Sansa’s kidnapper has erected between them, so I thought it only fitting that they do the negotiating and rescuing on their own terms.


End file.
